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Ring of Fire (song)
| Length = 2:38 | Label = Columbia | Producer = Don Law | Writer = | Last single = "Busted" (1962) | This single = "Ring of Fire" (1963, 1968) | Next single = "The Matador" (1963) | Misc = }} | Length = 4:58 | Label = MGM | Writer = | Producer = Tom Wilson | Certification = | Chart position = | Last single = "White Houses" (1968) | This single = "Ring of Fire" (1969) | Next single = "River Deep Mountain High" (1969) }} | Format = | Recorded = 2013–14 | Genre = | Length = 3:15 | Label = | Producer = Jens Bogren | Certification = }} "Ring of Fire", or "The Ring of Fire", is a song written by June Carter Cash and Merle Kilgore and recorded by Johnny Cash. |work=AllMusic|accessdate=December 19, 2014}} The single appears on Cash's 1963 album, Ring of Fire: The Best of Johnny Cash. The song was originally recorded by June's sister, Anita Carter, on her Mercury Records album Folk Songs Old and New (1963) as "(Love's) Ring of Fire". "Ring of Fire" was ranked No. 4 on CMT's 100 Greatest Songs of Country Music in 2003 and #87 on Rolling Stone's list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. The song was recorded on March 25, 1963, and became one of the biggest hits of Cash's career, staying at number one on the country chart for seven weeks. It was certified Gold on January 21, 2010, by the RIAA and has also sold over 1.2 million digital downloads. Conception Although "Ring of Fire" sounds ominous, the term refers to falling in love – which is what June Carter was experiencing with Johnny Cash at the time. Some sources claim that Carter had seen the phrase "Love is like a burning ring of fire," underlined in one of her uncle A. P. Carter's Elizabethan books of poetry."Obituary: Anita Carter". The poem was "Love's Ring Of Fire by Bob Johnston, according to Johnny Cash by Stephen Miller. The (London) Independent. August 4, 1999. Retrieved on March 23, 2007."Google Books Search, Johnny Cash, by Steve Miller". She worked with Kilgore on writing a song inspired by this phrase as she had seen her uncle do in the past. She had written: "There is no way to be in that kind of hell, no way to extinguish a flame that burns, burns, burns"."Ring of Fire". RollingStone.com. December 9, 2004. Retrieved on March 23, 2007. Cash's first wife, Vivian Liberto, offers a different conception of "Ring of Fire" in her book I Walked the Line. She contends that June Carter Cash was not a co-writer of the song: "To this day, it confounds me to hear the elaborate details June told of writing that song for Johnny. She didn't write that song any more than I did. The truth is, Johnny wrote that song, while pilled up and drunk, about a certain private female body part. All those years of her claiming she wrote it herself, and she probably never knew what the song was really about." Liberto claims that Cash decided to give Carter co-writer status because "She needs the money". The song was originally recorded by June's sister, Anita Carter, on her Mercury Records album Folk Songs Old and New (1963) as "(Love's) Ring of Fire". Mercury released Anita's version as a single and it was a featured "pick hit" in Billboard magazine. After hearing Anita's version, Cash claimed he had a dream where he heard the song accompanied by "Mexican horns". Cash stated, "I'll give you about five or six more months, and if you don't hit with it, I'm gonna record it the way I feel it." Cash noted that adding trumpets was a change to his basic sound. When the song failed to become a major hit for Anita, Cash recorded it his own way, adding the mariachi-style horns. This sound was later used in the song "It Ain't Me Babe", which was recorded around the same time. Mother Maybelle and the Carter sisters are prominently featured in the Cash recording singing harmony. Cash tinkered with a few of the original phrases in Anita Carter's version of the song. Cash's daughter Rosanne has stated, "The song is about the transformative power of love and that's what it has always meant to me and that's what it will always mean to the Cash children.""Cash family blocks haemorrhoid ad". BBC.com. February 18, 2004. Retrieved on March 23, 2007. In 2004, Merle Kilgore, who shared writing credit for the song with June Carter Cash, proposed licensing the song for a hemorrhoid cream commercial. When performing the song live, Kilgore would often "mock dedicate" the song to "The makers of Preparation H". However, June's heirs were not of a like mind, and they refused to allow the song to be licensed for the ad. Chart performance Johnny Cash version Eric Burdon and the Animals version Alan Jackson version Legacy Numerous cover versions of "Ring of Fire" have been produced, the most commercially successful version being by Eric Burdon & the Animals. Their version was recorded at the end of 1968, and made the top 40 in four different countries. In late 1974, the Eric Burdon Band released a hard rock version. Wall of Voodoo debuted with a cover of the song on their self-titled 1980 EP and featured a pulsing synthesizer. Dwight Yoakam covered it on his debut album Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc. Punk rock band Social Distortion covered it on their 1990 self-titled LP. A cover of the song by Alan Jackson with guest vocals from Lee Ann Womack was released as a single on December 6, 2010. It served as the lead-off single to his 34 Number Ones compilation album, and peaked at #45 in the Hot Country Songs, becoming his first single to miss the top 40 since "Just Put a Ribbon in Your Hair" peaked at #51 in 2004.artist=alan jackson|chart=Country Songs}} Alan Jackson USA chart history, Billboard.com. Retrieved June 11, 2012. It was his last single released by Arista Records. Cash's version of "Ring Of Fire" was never released as a single in the United Kingdom. However, in 1993 / 1994, the song gained significant radio airplay in the UK after it was used in a popular television commercial for Levi Jeans (entitled 'Campfire'). In 2014, British band DragonForce released a power metal version of the song on their sixth album Maximum Overload. Madonna sang a cover version of Cash's song on the Nashville date of her Rebel Heart Tour on 8 January 2016. References External links * Category:1963 singles Category:1969 singles Category:2010 singles Category:2014 singles Category:Songs written by Merle Kilgore Category:Johnny Cash songs Category:Dwight Yoakam songs Category:Mark Collie songs Category:George Canyon songs Category:Alan Jackson songs Category:The Animals songs Category:Social Distortion songs Category:Billboard Hot Country Songs number-one singles Category:Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients Category:Columbia Records singles Category:MGM Records singles Category:Epic Records singles Category:Arista Nashville singles Category:Songs written by June Carter Cash Category:1963 songs